Stylish first trailer for David O. Russells American Hustle: watch now

American Hustle - the latest comedy-drama from David O. Russell - has revealed a first trailer via ABC News on US telly.

The YouTube video below will likely be ripped off the net, so get watching fast. As soon as an official embed lands, we’ll add that video here.

Based loosely on the ‘Abscam’ events of the ‘70s - an FBI sting that ended up uncovering government corruption - it looks like a change of pace from Silver Linings Playbook , although that film’s stars return, and Russell’s knack for placing eccentric characters in unique situations remains intact.

The film stars The Fighter ’s Christian Bale and Amy Adams as a pair of con artists, who are brought into the sting by Bradley Cooper’s sublimely permed FBI agent. Jennifer Lawrence plays Bale’s wife, with Jeremy Renner also on board as a political figure.

While the trailer doesn’t dish a huge amount of plot details, it really sells in the tone: the '70s stylings and rocking soundtrack hark back to prime Scorsese, and while there’s not a huge amount of dialogue, all the actors appear to be on top form: could Russell be leading his cast to another round of awards nods?

It’s also going to be worth watching purely for Bale and Cooper’s styling (although Adams and Lawrence bring a bit of karmic balance by going super-glam).

Get watching the American Hustle trailer below:

American Hustle opens in the UK on 26 December 2013. With Ben Stiller’s The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty opening on the same day, it looks like our Boxing Day is sorted…

Matt Maytum
Editor, Total Film

I'm the Editor at Total Film magazine, overseeing the running of the mag, and generally obsessing over all things Nolan, Kubrick and Pixar. Over the past decade I've worked in various roles for TF online and in print, including at 12DOVE, and you can often hear me nattering on the Inside Total Film podcast. Bucket-list-ticking career highlights have included reporting from the set of Tenet and Avengers: Infinity War, as well as covering Comic-Con, TIFF and the Sundance Film Festival.

Latest in Movies
Theo James as Hal in Osgood Perkins' The Monkey
It might only be March, but Stephen King adaptation The Monkey is now the highest grossing horror movie of 2025
Cyborg and Batman together
Justice League stars Ray Fisher and Ben Affleck are teaming up for new thriller Animals
Batman and Catwoman talking
Robert Pattinson is hoping to team up with his The Batman co-star Zoe Kravitz on another project soon
Keanu Reeves and Brzrkr
Justin Lin to helm Keanu Reeves' comic book movie adaptation BRZRKR for Netflix
Train to Busan passengers
Train to Busan director is returning to the horror sub-genre with a new movie described as the culmination of his zombie universe
Thomas Shelby on a horse
Although Netflix is making the Peaky Blinders movie, fans need not to worry as it will be released in theaters too
Latest in News
Balatro
Balatro creator started "properly playing the game myself about a week before launch" and had "a pretty emotional moment" where he realized it's "actually fun"
Death Stranding 2 Collector's Edition
Hideo Kojima reveals Death Stranding 2: On the Beach release date, and the Collector's Edition includes exactly what I predicted it would
Kingmakers
Kingmakers is a strategy game about taking on medieval armies with a gun, but its devs thought the giant mech was too much
The Witcher 3 lead says "not many games" were trying to match the RPG back in 2015, and that meant "there was a risk" to making it in the first place
The Blood of Dawnwalker
The Witcher 3 dev says his new vampire RPG Blood of Dawnwalker wants to challenge genre conventions, but only if "we're changing them to actually achieve some goal"
Daredevil recap: The Defenders
Marvel fans are discussing which of the Netflix series characters would have survived the Blip